--- title: Speed up the macOS Dock animation description: Kill the show/hide delay and animation so the Dock snaps in and out with zero lag. tags: [macos, terminal, productivity] type: blog date: 2026-07-11 --- If you auto-hide the Dock, macOS makes you wait twice: a delay before it starts sliding, then the slide itself. On a machine that's otherwise fast, that lag is the one thing that feels slow. Two `defaults` tweaks remove both. ## Prerequisite Turn on **Automatically hide and show the Dock** first, under **Settings → Desktop & Dock**. These tweaks only affect the auto-hide behavior, so there's nothing to see until the Dock actually hides. ## The command Paste this into Terminal: ```bash defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-time-modifier -int 0 defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-delay -float 0 killall Dock ``` The Dock will flicker once as it restarts, then show and hide with no animation at all. \ ## What each line does * `autohide-time-modifier -int 0` sets the show/hide animation duration to zero, so the Dock appears and disappears instantly instead of sliding. * `autohide-delay -float 0` removes the pause before the Dock starts hiding once your cursor leaves it. * `killall Dock` restarts the Dock so the changes take effect right away. ## Reverting To go back to the default behavior, delete the two keys and restart the Dock: ```bash defaults delete com.apple.dock autohide-time-modifier defaults delete com.apple.dock autohide-delay killall Dock ``` Prefer a slightly slower snap over instant? Set `autohide-time-modifier` to a small value like `0.15` instead of `0`.